>> we really think that president obama won the campaign in the spring. and what is key is in the west wing, in late may his advisors basically told him we wan to spend the fall's budget right now, on a really tough tv assault against romney. and the president had to be convinced by the advisors to do this, and obviously he was thinking financially are we going to have that money in the fall or spend it now it was a risk but one that ultimately paid off for president obama. governor romney at that point was still trying to put together the pieces for his primary just ended. >> why didn't he respond? why didn't they refute the attacks about bain capitol? >> one of the issues was governor romney was just not willing to lend himself money as he was in 2008. there was a perception among his senior staff that he didn't want to be seen as buying the election. so in order for him to have gone toe-to-toe with obama at that point in time he would have had to use his own money and that wasn't even broached in the campaign. >> warner: one of the most fascinating thi